Family Herbal - Electric Scotland

52 FAMILY HERBAL:
leaves upon them. On the top of each stands
a spike of flowers, of a pale reddish colour;
the whole does not rise to more than eight inches
in height. These appear in March. When they
are dead, the leaves grow up ; these are roundish,
green on the upper side, and whitish underneath,
of a vast bigness, and stand singly upon hollowed
foot-stalks, of a purplish, whitish, or greenish co-
lour; thev are often two feet broad. The root
is white and long, it creeps under the surface of the
ground.
The root, is the part, used ; it is praised very
highly, as a remedy in pestilential fevers ; hut,
whether it deserves that praise
or not, it is a good
diuretic, and excellent in the gravel.
Bur-reed. Sparganium.
A COMMON water plant, with leaves like
heads of seeds : It is two or three
flags, and rough
feet
high. The stalks are round, green, thick,
and upright. The leaves are
very long and narrow,
sharp at the edges, and with a sharp ridge
on the back along the middle ; thev are of a pale
green, and look fresh and beautiful. The flowers
are inconsiderable and : yellowish they stand in a
kind of circular tufts about the upper parts of the
stalk : lower down stand the rough fruits called
burs, from whence the plant obtained its name ;
they are of the bigness of a large nut meg, green and
rough. The root is composed of a quantity of
while fibres.
The unripe fruit is used : thev are aslringcut,
and good against fluxes of the bellv, and bleedings
of all kinds: the best way of giving them
is infused in a rough red wine, with a little cin-
iiamini. They use them in some parts of England